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Facility

Excerpt From the pod/videocast above: “Facility can be, but is not limited to, Familiarity with Vocabulary, Execution of the Vocabulary, also it’s about Balance, Equilibrium, Kinesthetic Awareness, Kinesthetic Listening, The Neurology of Leading, The Neurology of Following (which is how you respond to something from a follower’s perspective), Proprioception, and last but not least Extending Your Capabilities. We’ll get to that last one in just a bit. Two of the more common aspects of Facility are Execution and Proprioception. So let’s quickly review what Tango Topics means when it refers to these ideas…“

Links that are important to this Tango Thought:

1.) Proprioception
2.) The 6 Ways of Walking.
3.) Perfectionism

MORE REMINDERS

Moscow For Leads

February 5, 2017 No Comments

There’s a row of women sitting in Moscow (usually several rows deep actually). Only these rows…are every Lead’s fantasy! Yup. Truth. Let’s get something straight. The food is awful. It’s usually effing cold anytime after september and before june. Getting in an out of Moscow (Russia) isn’t exactly a piece of cake (for an American), there are hoops to jump through (read that as VISA issues). It is not exactly cheap. And there is rampant crime in ways you can’t even begin to imagine.

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The Seasoned Dancer

April 8, 2017 No Comments

The dancer who has been dancing for a certain amount of time has passed through the multiple, multiple flirtations. They’ve had the flirtations that lead to attractions, and then the attractions that turn into dalliances, and some that go beyond that.

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Waiting vs. Listening

June 2, 2018 No Comments

What is Waiting Vs. Listening ? In it’s simplest form this comparison deals with the axiom of Followers are told to "Wait for your L/lead", and instead implies that there is another idea sitting there that almost never gets talked about and in today’s Tango world almost never gets used, which is "Listening".

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Sweating

January 28, 2017 No Comments

Tango can be, and usually is, a sweaty business for a variety of reasons. Not the least of which is the fact that in many places there are noise ordinances that prevent Milonga organizers from opening the windows. Or the venue where the Milonga is held, their air conditioning units are not up to the task, and are easily overwhelmed by more than 50 people in a room for sustained usage.

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Physiological Contact

January 2, 2017 No Comments

There is one aspect of The ‘Connection’ Fallacy that comes up a lot and that’s the idea that there is some mystical/spiritual/magical way in which we communicate in the dance. That communication is stated as how our ‘connection’ is to someone and them to us and how well we ‘connected’ with each other. Rubbish! Not to piss in someone’s Cheerios but that’s just magical thinking.

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Tango Accents

January 20, 2017 No Comments

You may not realize this but you have an accent. The place that you live in, the people that you dance with, the teachers that you have studied with, and last but not least, the variation of those ideas from the original, creates a local tango ‘accent’. Every city where Tango is danced has an accent which is specific to that place and to that place alone. Boston, San Francisco, Paris, London, Berlin, Moscow, etc. They all have one, up to and including Buenos Aires, especially Buenos Aires! The difference between your local flavor of Tango and say Boston, Paris, and London, is like night and day within a spectrum of ideas.

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Cake!

February 19, 2017 No Comments

Should you eat before, or after a milonga, or not at all ? Some people say “before, so that you don’t get hungry during the milonga”. But then they complain that they can’t move as freely. Some people say “After! Because I’ll be ravenous”. But then these same people quite factually ‘grumble’ (meaning their stomachs are growling because they’re hungry) while they dance with you. Some people are in the ‘not’ at all category! They can seemingly contain their exertion and not require sustenance before, during, and after a milonga.

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The Practica

February 22, 2017 No Comments

The idea of a Practica is ‘theoretically’ to Practice what you have learned. To try out what you have been shown, with multiple partners, as if you were in a class rotation. It is ‘theoretical’ because while the theory is nice, the reality is a little different.

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Being Criticized

January 8, 2017 No Comments

The truth is that this is critical feedback, about what you’re doing and how you’re doing it. Hopefully that critical feedback or criticism is done with exacting detail, which is needed for analysis, breakdown, and then reconstruction or rebuilding your posture, walk, embrace, vocabulary, and/or musical interpretation. Without that critical feedback, you will continue to make the same mistakes over and over again thinking that everything is happy and lovely when in fact it’s not.

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10 REASONS TO SUBSCRIBE

There are 4 Levels of Access: Free, Basic, Premium, and Premium+. Free pays nothing but gets a perk just for signing up. 

1.) Free Users get to see 5 of the 125 Different Tango Topics on the site. Plus you get access to the entire Tango Reminders and Tango Ideas sections of the site. These are short form Topic descriptors with a little detail about the topic and the video.

2.) Basic and Premium users Save A BOATLOAD of MONEY! Buying this stuff outright is expensive.

3.) Basic, Premium, and Premium+ users get access to the ALL ARTICLES and THE FULL ARTICLE which you can’t see right now.

4.) Basic, Premium, and Premium+ users have way better video resolution: Free = 420p, Basic = 720p, Premium = 1080p and 4K. 

5.) Basic, Premium, and Premium+ users get the ‘Dancing Perspectives’ & ‘The Soup’ sections of the document you just read (Lead, Follow, and Dancing) which are open to you. And that’s where all the good stuff is at. 

6.) Video Downloads! 

7.) Access to the Tango Topics Music Library (22 Curated Golden Age Orchestras)

8.) Access to ‘Tango Del Dia’ – Our Music Education System with access to 14 Days of Music, 30 Days of Music Education, and 30 More Days of Tango Del Dia. 

9.) We explain things, break the vocabulary down in a visual way, from multiple angles, showing feet, hands, and close ups! Yes there’s a lot of talking but we want you to understand what it is that you’re doing and why, not just steps, patterns, and figure

and #10:
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Keep something in the back of your mind: What you’re seeing in a youtube video is a couple that is performing for the 15th row for a room full of people. They’re not social dancing! Whereas this website is all about ‘Social Tango’  or how to make things function on a social dance floor. Social Dance floor ? Your local milonga! They are showing you flashy moves as a presentation, to show off! But not stopping and talking about how this works which is what you need to see. This website and all of it’s content show you the how and  why you’d want to put that piece of vocabulary there, or how to make things work. This website is all about those things and more!

You could watch Tango YouTube videos and thereby spend your time, trying to infer, and figure out how things may work in that particular situation. Bend your body this way or that, twist and force this position or that. Place your foot here or there and figure it out. This is known as Tango Twister.  Which can be a lot of fun, but more than likely it won’t help you, because you’re missing something: The explanation from an experienced teacher showing you how to properly excute this stuff from a Leading Perspective as well as from a Following Perspective!

The goal of YouTube videos is to get you to study with those teachers in person. The goal of Tango Topics videos allows you to work at your own pace, in the comfort of your own space, so that you can play them over and over again to improve your understanding of the vocabulary or technique being described to therefore better your dancing experience. The goal of classes and workshops is to get you to come back over and over and over again, thereby spending more money with that teacher. This website and the videos under it are here to act as a resource for you to help you to improve your dance. Pay once and you’re done.

Eventually, one way or another you’re going to pay for this lesson, either here and now, or with them. TANSTAAFL! The difference between that lesson and this ? Is that you get to play this lesson over and over and over again. Further still, there are supporting materials (other videos) that help to explain the language and the underlying technique of how and why things work, so you can easily reference those things in the corresponding articles that go with the material, and or any language in the Tango Topics Dictionary. 

DROP ME A MSG HERE

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